This ballot is closed! Below you will see theclosing status of the ballot. Please let me know if you see any errors.

Thanks very much to everyone who took the time to participate. Your participation is appreciated. I will continue to collect comments if they include‘+++ LMSC P&P Revision Ballot Results to date +++ WG Voting Rules’in the title. Comment resolution will take place during the previously posted telecoms times. I will provide recommended resolutions the day before the telecoms when possible.

The sentence added at the end of 7.1.4.2.1 is unnecessarily restrictive. As written, this could be interpreted to restrict my ability to bring something before the EC as an individual member of the EC. It should only apply to matters advanced to the EC by WG action. How about:

"Numerical vote tallies must be taken on all items forwarded by the Working Group to the EC."

or

"Numerical vote tallies must be taken on all Working Group business required by these P&P to be approved by the EC."

Must the full WG membership be reflected in the denominator of electronic ballots

Numerical vote tallies are required for all matters brought before the EC

Level of approval required for procedural votes

Directed Positions for Procedural Issues

Rules for gaining, losing, and maintaining membership

1 is already clear in the existing text and there is no change to address it.

-----------The following issue is the reason for my disapprove.

None of the changes address 2 and 2 doesn't accurately state the problem. The denominator to be used is clear for the pass percentage in the existing text. There is a problem in the existing text in that the entire text about the required Yea vs. Nay and participation percentages to pass appears to apply only to a Working Group Confirmation letter ballot. It appears in a paragraph about forwarding a draft or revised standard and it says "Working Group Confirmation letter ballot". No requirements are stated for "other matters" decided by a letter ballot. The original section only dealt with draft balloting and when we modified it to add other matters we did a poor job. The text about the options for a ballot containing three choices is only appropriate to draft ballots. A Do Not Approve on a motion sent to the working group by email shouldn't require comments since it wouldn't require comments during a meeting and an abstention shouldn't require a reason. I suggest we clean this up by first establishing short names for the two kinds of letter ballot: forwarding letter ballot and motion letter ballot. Then always use letter ballot, forwarding letter ballot, or motion letter ballot when stating a requirement so it is clear where it applies.

For a motion letter ballot, should it always require 75% to pass or should it be 50% for procedural like a meeting vote? - I could make arguments for either way but I lean toward 50% for procedural. What should be the participation requirement? Since an interim requires a 50% quorum as does a forwarding letter ballot, 50% is reasonable.

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6 isn't addressed and while there have changes suggested in the past for our current rules, I'm not aware of any consensus on a change to them. If we do try such a change would be best handled as a separate ballot since it will probably be controversial.

I agree that Bob's wording is better for the change to 7.2.4.2.1.

There still seems to be a discrepancy between the description of handling procedural matters in the P&P and actual practice in the working groups.

7.2.4.1: The Chair of the Working Group decides procedural issues.

7.2.4.2.1 as modified: Procedural matters put by the Chair to the group may be decided by a majority vote.

But what happens in the Working Groups (at least in 802.3) is that people make motions that the chair classifies as procedural or technical and then we vote on them. The chair isn't putting the matter to the group; the mover is. Perhaps you could say that in letting the motion go to vote rather than deciding it, the chair is choosing to put it to the group. I would prefer that we make that clear in 7.2.4.1 by modifying it to:

The Chair of the Working Group may decide procedural issues or may put them to a vote of the Working Group.

9.3 The added sentence should be moved to the prior paragraph (which is the one that calls out the 75% requirement). The new sentence also seems somewhat contradictory since the prior text says 75% required to pass per subclause 7.2.4.2.1 which only applies to technical. I suggest:

After a Working Group motion has been passed that establishes the Working Group’s position, a separate Directed Position motion is required to make that Working Group Position a Directed Position. Directed Positions may be formed by the Working Group on both technical and procedural matters but a Directed Position motion is always treated as a technical motion requiring 75% approval to pass per subclause 7.2.4.2.1.

The rationale for this ballot states that the changes address (among other things):

Must the full WG membership be reflected in the denominator of electronic ballots

Rules for gaining, losing, and maintaining membership

Neither of these issues are addressed in any aspect by the changes presented for ballot.

In particular, the section on gaining and losing voting membership is currently worse than it ever was (if that is possible!). For example:

- First para of 7.2.3.1: "Participation is defined as at least 75% presence at a meeting." So apparently, I can show up for 75% of one morning meeting during a session and I have achieved participation. Various other misapplications of session/meeting terminology there.

- "7.2.3.2 Retention Membership is retained by participating in at least two of the last four Plenary session meetings. One duly constituted interim Working Group or task group meeting may be substituted for one of the two Plenary meetings." Again, it seems as if I only have to show up at 2 meetings during one session to achieve retention.

- 7.2.3.3 Loss: We seem to have lost the requirement to meet financial obligations (unless it has been moved elsewhere?).

- Widespread confusion between meeting and session in this section, with consequent ambiguity.

I vote disapprove on this matter. I am willing to change my vote to approve, with the following changes:

1. changing the decision of procedural matters put by the chair from a majority to a vote as required by Robert's Rules. Closing debate, changing P&P, and other matters require more than a simple majority. The LMSC P&P should not overrule RRO in these matters.

2. the vote on a directed position could be clearer. please consider new language like "a directed position is formed by a motion stating the exact wording of the directed position being approved in the WG by more than 75% of the voting members voting yea and nay on the motion."

Procedural matters put by the Chair to the group may be decided by a majority vote.

This is vague. Procedure matters are either decided by a majority or not. Saying it “may” be decided by majority implies that the chair can choose between 75% and a majority. The text should read “Procedural matters put by the Chair to the group are decided by a majority”

The Working Group Chair may vote at meetings.

This implies that the Chair can vote on any matter during a meeting. It is my impression that the rules typically only allow the Chair to vote if the Chair’s vote changes the outcome of the vote. I believe that the rules should read in that manner. I believe the 802 Chair voting rules are that way.

Numerical vote tallies must be taken on all matters that will be brought before the EC.

*In 7.2.4.2.1, it is time to end the ambiguity and uncertainty around WG interim sessions resulting from the statement "No quorum is required at meetings held in conjunction with the Plenary session since the Plenary session time and place is established well in advance. A quorum is required at other Working Group meetings. The Working Group Chair may vote at meetings. A quorum is at least one-half of the Working Group members." The sentences are also out of order.

Remedy: Change the quote above to "The Working Group Chair may vote on all Working Group issues. No quorum is required at meetings, such as those held in conjunction with the Plenary session, whose session time and place are established at least six months in advance.

Otherwise, a quorum is required; this may be established by the attendance at the session by at least half of the membership."

I believe the old wording on procedural issues was far preferable - namely:

"The Chair of the Working Group decides procedural issues."

Clearly, within that definition, the Chair is at liberty to seek the help of the WG in deciding such issues if he/she sees fit, as is routinely done in many working groups already. However, it usefully means that the WG doesn't have to take a vote in order to break for coffee.

802 I have always understood that the Chair does not vote unless it changes the outcome. Is this more of a tradition than a rule? Maybe it is a rule in some working groups and not others. Anyone else have information of whether the individual working groups have rules that differ from the 802 rules? Maybe that is where I picked it up from.

Also, I checked Roberts Rules and it states that the chair only votes

1) On ballots

2) If the chair's vote will change the result of the vote.

I now feel like a real member of the EC now that I am quoting Roberts Rules :)

There is both ambiguity and uncertainty around WG interim sessions because of the quorum requirement. One problem is that there is no clear definition of quorum. Do we count the number of members registered or attending some part of the session? Or do we count the number of people in a room at a given time? Also, what about the tradition in some WGs of authorizing a future interim session to act, with or without a quorum? The status of this tradition is ambiguous.

The uncertainty comes from the fact that a WG cannot effectively plan its work and meet its deadlines if it doesn't know whether it will be able to make decisions at a meeting.

Yes, I am definitely proposing a change. But we are looking at a piece of the P&P that justifies itself in detail: "No quorum is required at meetings held in conjunction with the Plenary session since the Plenary session time and place is established well in advance." I am suggesting that the same logic apply to interim sessions. If their time and place is established well in advance, then they ought to be subject to the same logic and the same rule.

The bias toward plenary sessions is unfair to the many WGs who meet on a regular basis, six times a year, and plan to progress their work each time. This whole issue is exacerbated by the fact that the plenary sessions are not geographically distributed. I think it's high time for us to fix the P&P to stop discriminating against interim WG meetings.

The LMSC rules and now P&P have allowed a WG chair to vote at meetings as long as I remember (7.2.4.2.1), but at least for some time, have not granted the LMSC Chair the same privilege on EC matters (7.1.4). That might be the source of confusion, WG Chair vrs. LMSC Chair.

In looking up the references though, I see after rereading, the text in

Thanks. That seems to be consistent with my reading also. So currently the EC chair and the WG chair have different voting rights.

It was pointed out to me that letting the chair vote or letting the chair vote when it changes the outcome give the chair essentially the same power, since if he does not vote when it does not change the results, it is no big deal.

The intent of the restriction is merely to preserve the sense of Chair impartiality by only allowing him to take positions on evenly split issues (e.g. a tie-breaker or maker). The Chair usually refrains from taking positions For or Against during discussion for the same reason. His voting rights are in no way impeded because he can vote whenever it WOULD make a difference.